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Thanks to the OP's decision, I've now seen this submission when I otherwise wouldn't have. Thanks to your hard work on the other hand, I've had to read an obnoxious gripe about reposts that I otherwise wouldn't have. Clearly you have the moral high ground here.

I was intrigued until I got to one I knew, Morocco, in Arabic El-Maghreb, fittingly meaning the west. Others might be true but I don't have any knowledge of them, but I've lost all credibility for the whole thing.

According to wikipedia: Latinization of the Croatian name Hrvatska, derived from Hrvat (Croat): a word of Persian origin, the name "Hrvati" is derived from the Avestan province Harahvaiti (Greek: Arachosia),which literally means "rich in waters/lakes".

The bird comes after the country. When America was discovered, pilgrims saw there these birds endemic to the continent. They thought the birds looked like quills from Turkey (at that time, the Ottoman Empire). So they named the bird "Turkey bird", "the bird from Turkey" and finally "Turkey".

Now the interesting part is this: When these birds were taken back to Europe, the Turks were still thinking that the newly discovered continent was not new, but it was actually India. So they named these birds "Indian Bird" and then "Indian". The name of turkey the bird is therefore "Hindi" in Turkish.

If anyone can measure the "bullshit factor" on this story, please help as I've found nothing but here goes...

I knew a girl a few years ago who was 1/4 Algonquin. She told me that the word "Kanata" doesn't mean literally "village". What the word translates to in literal terms is "where we live". The Algonquins at the time didn't have terms to differentiate between settlements of any particular size. We have terms like village, town, city and all that but no Algonquin would have ever seen a settlement that had more than a few hundred people in it. So when the Algonquins were pointing to the village, and referring to it as Kanata it meant "where we live". Depending on context, Kanata can mean your street, your house, your block, and all that.

I always loved the idea that my country's name meant "where we live" rather than just "village".

Canada: is from Kanata, meaning "settlement" or "village" in the language of the Huron.

I know what you're trying to say, Heretik, but perhaps that is a linguistic issue? If the natives don't have a term for "settlements" and it's just "This is where we live" then perhaps the original settlers decided to translate it to something that seems to have meaning. So, the natives could understand it as "Where we live" but because (back then) where they lived was a village, it subsequently became known (to us) as "village".

Can't weigh in on your story, but when my mom was a new teacher in the late 70s, she had a student fill out a geography questionnaire thing...
What town do you live in? A: Virginia
What county do you live in? A: Virginia
What state do you live in? A: Virginia ...

True, the Romans originally called England "Albion" which is derived from the Latin word for "white." It may be a reference to the white cliffs of Dover. In late Latin this name is "Anglia." This is how England's people came to be known as Angles. Angle Land = Engle Land = England.

You can 'shop whatever name you want on that map and resubmit it 8 or 9 hours from now, none will be the wiser.

My understanding is that the name "Anglia" came from the Germanic "Angles," one of the migratory groups that settled the region with the Saxons. The term "England" is derived from the kingdoms they raised, such as East Anglia.

The term "England" is derived from the kingdoms they raised, such as East Anglia.

No. England was under complete Anglo-Saxon control by the 8th century, and for what ever reason all of the tribes that formed the Anglo-Saxons ended up referring to themselves as Angles. Soon the entire country (ununified) came to be called Englaland* (land of the Angles). And finally Engla rice** (English Kingdom) upon unification [King Æþelstan - 927AD].

*Alternative spellings are Ænglaland and Anglaland, but Englaland was the most common.
**Rice (Ree-cheh) is a cognate with the German "Reich", if you wanted to know.

I'm from Belgium and I can assure you that Belgium does not mean "Bag or Bale-Fire or Our Shinng One" but is derived from Gallia Belgica meaning more or less The low lands of Gaul. Basically Belgium means the same as Netherlands but is derived from Latin instead of Dutch.

Slovakia/Slovenia - the names are derived from the word Slavic and as far as I know and read on wikipedia it could have roots in a term describing "people who speak (the same language)" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavic_peoples#Ethnonym. ("word" is "slovo" in Slovak, also "glory" is "slava")

I temporarily forgot where Nigeria was, and thought it was called the land of honest men. I chuckled, and went back to sending my bank details to my the lawyer of some uncle I'd never heard of. Apparently, he was really rich!

The hanzi/kanji could mean 'country,' 'kingdom,' 'nation,' etc. I think 'central' is a better way to translate the meaning than the more literal 'middle,' since central has all the connotations of focus and importance that middle might be missing.

I live in a town called Redruth which translates as River red. Double checking with Wikipedia it tells me this.

The name Redruth (pronounced 'Re-drooth') derives from its Cornish name, Rhyd-ruth. Rhyd an older form of 'Res', which is a Cornish equivalent to a ford (across a river). It is the 'ruth' (and not the 'Red' part of the name) which means the colour red.

Romania? Um, it means "Land of the Romans." While you could go back to the etymology of the word "Rome," it's ambiguous, aside from the myth of Romulus, and either way the country was named with the Romans in mind, not whatever the word "Rome" is derived from.

Australia? It just means "Southern Land." "Unknown Southern Land" ("Terra Australis Incognita") was a name given to a hypothetical southern continent where we now know Australia and Antarctica are.

And Madagascar doesn't mean anything. It's just a corruption of the name of Mogadishu, which Marco Polo confused with Madagascar somehow. (And yes, the Malagasy call their country Madagasikara.)